graffiti.maverick

to jam or not to jam that is the question...

2009-07-01T01:51:07Z

Gladstone Ruckus
at the Pimp Plaza - Jammy Jam 2K6

It's that time again.

Jammy Jam is nigh. Well, pretty nigh anyway. My birthday is August 1st, and since that's a Saturday, I figure that I should actually have Jammy Jam on that day this year.

The problem is I haven't been planning it. Like at all. In the last several years, it's been a huge party. Bands, beer pong, prizes, costume contests, kissing contests, stripper poles, clothing optional hottubing. It's been nuts but it's been a lot of fun.

In the past I've always planned it as best I could but also flown by the seat of my pants a little. That has it's good points and it's bad. But this year I haven't really been talking to anyone about it, at least not until yesterday when I talked to a few people about it. I don't know who's planning on coming. I don't know if people are coming in from out of town. I don't have any bands lined up. I haven't bought prizes or even planned my outfits. There is so much to do.

Don't get me wrong. I love it. I just don't want to go through the trouble if no one cares. (I really hope you do)

So now I'm trying to decide what I should do for my birthday. Should I go all out like the last couple years and have bands and such? Should I get karaoke? Should I go lower key like my other parties and just do prizes? Should I dump the jammies and lingerie aspect altogether and just throw a big naked orgy? Should I become all grown up and sophisitcated and have some sort of tea and crumpet soiree of some sort. Or maybe wine and cheese?

Who's interested in coming? Does anyone have a band that would be interested in playing in my basement for free beer? Anyone have good prize suggestions. Let me know.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

2009-03-07T08:29:21Z

3-6-09
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

Saw Watchmen tonight. I had intended to review it here and then link to it from my 365 project, but I ended up pretty much saying everything I wanted over there. So I figured I'd just copy it here.

I'm going to try very hard not to leave spoilers here.

So today should be a happy day. I've been waiting for a Watchmen movie for the better part of my life. Today that dream came true.

Sometimes dreams should just be dreams.

It certainly wasn't the worst movie ever. In fact, I had intentionally kept my expectations low. I'm quite capable of doing that.

Don't get me wrong, even though I was keeping my expectations low, I really really wanted it to be a good movie. And it had it's moments. I certainly didn't expect it to be as ground breaking and medium changing as the comic was. But I wanted to enjoy it, and there were even things I did enjoy. But there was just too much.

The problem with most adaptations, comic books or otherwise, is that they deviate too far from the source material and they piss off the fans. A lot has been made of the ending to Watchmen being changed. I didn't really care much for the new ending but that wasn't that big a deal. Beyond that, they tried to be "faithful" to the book. To make sure they got every detail in that fans would be looking for.

They should have cut more.

The major text of Watchmen is 384 pages long. To accurately portray it on screen in a minute for minute translation, I'd estimate it'd run about 6 and a half hours or so. Undoable. So they cut it down. Removed all the minor characters. Removed a lot of the minor subplots, and tried to just hit all the major beats that made the story great.

Except, those major moments, while memorable were all very carefully crafted by Alan Moore (the original writer) to tie together all those minor subplots. By breezing through them we ended up with a lot of details that really go nowhere. There are details that occur that while they may look cool don't have any setup because the subtle foreshadowing earlier in the story simply isn't present. There are enough Chekov's guns in the movie to arm a small army.

What this means is we have a movie nearly three hours long that is paced incredibly poorly. Sure it was fun, but it wasn't good. A good adaptation makes me go "wow, that's awesome, I have to read the original book and see what that was like." Watchmen didn't do that. If I had never read the book, and I saw the film and knew everyone loved the book, I'd say "eh, I guess that was ok for a comic book movie, but really, what's all the fuss?"

That's the big issue. There's little ones too. Stylistic problems I had with the cinematography, costuming and special effects. Stylistically, I want Watchmen to be somewhere along the vein of the Dark Knight. Instead, I felt like I got Batman Forever. This is not a good thing. I mean, I guess it's fine, but I don't want to laugh at Watchmen (and make no mistake I was laughing AT it, not WITH it). I want to be engrossed by it. I wasn't. In fact, I really think that if I wasn't already a fan, and wanted to give it a chance I would have been even more annoyed than I am.

Is it worth seeing, I guess. And it's unreasonable to expect it to be as meaningful as the book, so I really worked on convincing myself that it wouldn't be. But I hoped to be pleasantly surprised. And while I certainly didn't expect it to be the best superhero movie ever, I really did think it'd probably be the best one of the year.

But honestly, at this point I can easily see the Wolverine movie or the GI Joe movie blowing it out of the water.

Hotness Conversion Chart

2009-02-20T08:19:00Z

Hotness Conversion Chart
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

Back in the early nineties, my friend jameel became frustrated with the commonly accepted Scale of Babes.

As a standard, men tend to rank women on a scale of 1 to 10. However this system is innately flawed because it doesn't allow proper granularity to really objectify a babe.

Jameel thus came up with the "halle" system. Theorizing at the time that Halle Berry was the sexiest woman alive, Jameel realized that if you were to divide her base attractiveness by a factor of 1000, you could come up with a standard unit, the millihalle(mh) which could then be used to more accurately score the attractiveness of any woman.

Of course Jameel's standard theory had the problem that one had to accept that 100% sexiness was equivalent to Halle Berry. I soon expanded upon the theory by postulating that a woman could theoretically score greater than 1000mh and remain on the scale. This yard stick served us well for many years.

However earlier today, Jameel came to me with the problem that he felt the scale was inefficient because there were now women walking the planet who far outranked Halle. Such as Rihanna, who I would estimate at a measure of approximately 5000mh. While this number is certainly still finite and measureable, it clearly creates a problem as it becomes difficult to plot Rihanna, Halle and mere mortal women on the same chart. Clearly the system needed to be rethought. We decided that perhaps moving to a logarithmic scale might make more sense.

I therefore spent this evening doing a lot of math. In the years since high school i had determined that advanced math is actually pretty useless in every day life. Today, I discovered not so much. What I've determined is that while the halle scale is still useful to rank women of relative similar attracitveness at any point along the spectrum, it fails for looking at the spectrum as a whole. This is where the Hawt(H) scale comes into play. Like the Bel, a Hawt can be defined as a logarithmic measure that describes the ∆ between two points along the scale. Hawts are a base 2 logarithmic measure. So someone who scores 10H is half as attractive as someone who ranks 11H. This measure of course loses the granularity that made the halle scale useful. i have solved this problem by introducing the deciHawt(dH), which as the name suggests is equivalent to 1/10 of a Hawt.

While it remains easy to measure an individual in a linear matter in the lack of any other individual to compare against, using the mH, the dH allows you to estimate the rest of the scale with relative ease, given a known value for any other person on the scale. It works like this.

dH = 10 log₂(mh)

Thus 1000mh is conveniently approximately equal to 100dH (actually, 99.6658dH). Shakira, who is twice as hot as Halle Berry ranks in at 110dH (around 2048mh) and Rihanna at five times as hot scores around 123dH (5042mh), and yet, your average completely unassuming but reasonably attractive woman who would score in the 65mh range (and therefore prohibitively far from the Halle, Shakira, Rihanna end of the scale for graphing) can be represented with a perfectly reasonable 60dH.

The scale is effectively infinite,but allows for much greater precision within the normal human range of attractiveness. Around 130dH (9000mh) the meaningfulness of hotness is basically lost on the human mind. And yet, a theoretical woman 1000 times as hot as Halle Berry and essentially inconceivable in a linear scale, ranks in at almost exactly 200dH.

So there you go. Print this out, study it, keep a copy in your wallet.

Whoever said that science couldn't change the world?

Crossposted to my Flickr stream.

on daisy dukes and badonkadonks...

2009-02-10T07:14:13Z

Jessica Simpson through the years
(compliments of US magazine)

So in case you haven't heard, Jessica Simpson is fat now. I know a lot of people probably wouldn't consider her fat, but by presidential decree, she's fat.

So, this weekend I caught one of the tabloid shows, I think it was called something like Inside Extra Access Tonight or something like that, and they just made this huge deal of Obama calling Jessica fat. I think it's funny of course, because he really didn't, he was just stating what was on the cover of the magazine. But contrary to what some Obama apologists are saying he was making a joke at her expense.

And contrary to what Simpson apologists might say, she is fat. Is she humongous? No. And the tabloid show interviewed a string of other celebs who gave the whole schpiel about how beautiful women come in all shapes and sizes, blah blah blah. And they did the whole riff on the problem with Hollywood is that it make regular women think they have to look like a magazine cover and bravo for Jessica Simpson for breaking that trend and being comfortable.

Let me clue you in on something. Jessica Simpson isn't a regular woman. Regular women have jobs and IQs over 14. Jessica Simpson is famous for two reasons, and neither of them are her singing or acting ability. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say she can't sing. I actually think she's a surprisingly decent singer. But I'm not really a fan, per se. No one is. Singing brought her to the dance, yeah. But it's her tits that made her homecoming queen.

Jessica Simpson's job is to be superhot. That's what she does for a living. A normal woman can look great being a size 12 (what she reportedly is right now, which honestly is by no means obese or anything), but her job is to be a size 2, which is what she was not very long ago. And when you gain that kind of weight, especially when you started off that small, well, that's called getting fat.

And Jessica is not ok with it. Don't fool yourself. People who are ok with criticism don't launch into speeches on stage about how they have the love of their life and that person makes them feel beautiful and so does God and God is all that matters, etc., etc., etc. People who are ok with their weight don't suddenly bust out the the Daisy Dukes after 4 years, but cut a longer pair than they've ever worn before and take to baggy t-shirts. That's not feeling "ok with it."

Trust me, I'm fat right now. I mean, I'm skinnier than a lot of people I know who I wouldn't really consider fat, but I'm not comparing myself to them. I'm comparing myself to what I looked like when I was in shape and I don't look like that right now. So I need to lose weight to get back there. And until I do, I wear shirts in the wrestling ring. That's all I'm saying.

So yeah, while I commend all you Hollywood types for coming to Jessica's defense, (Carmen Electra, Ashlee Simpson, Kim Kardashian, and Heidi Klum), give me a fucking break. I don't see any of you going up five dress sizes in a year.

So in closing, yes... she's fat. The president says so. And whatever the president says goes. Jessica Simpson is fat. Blowjobs don't count as sexual relations. Mission Accomplished.

on commemorative plates and shooting a man for snoring too loud...

2009-02-01T06:54:16Z

1-31-09
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

Felt like ranting a little, and decided that this would be worth sharing not only with the livejournal world but also with my 365 self-portrait fans, since I was devoting my picture to it. So check over there if you want to see what livejournal people are saying on the subject.

Steph and I were watching TV tonight and there was a commercial that I took note of. It was a commercial for the Commemorative Barack Obama Historic Victory plate. Because of the unprecedented demand they are expecting orders of this historic heirloom from the American Historic Society to be SO HIGH, they are limiting orders to no more than TWO PER HOUSEHOLD! So like order yours now and everything.

Excuse me for a moment, while I go outside...

WHAT IN THE BLOODY BLUE FUCK!?!?!?!

Ahem... Excuse me. Sorry about that, I'm back now.

Ok, I get that there are Obama fans out there. Really, first black president, it is pretty historic. Totally, get that. And seriously, I'm the last person to disparage anyone for wasting their money on stupid crap. I spend tons of money on tons of stupid crap. But seriously, who the fuck buys this shit?

I mean, this isn't the first time I've seen a commercial like this of course, there's always been random plates, coins and chess sets made to celebrate the birth of the nation, the civil war, space shuttle explosions, planes flying into skyscrapers and whatever. They've always been there. I'm 34 years old, and if it's not obvious, I've watched like a LOT of TV in my life. I've seen these commercials a million times over the years, but I've never bought a single commemorative plate.

I know lots of people. People from all walks of life. I have friends who are lawyers and friends who are cab drivers. I know millionaires and welfare moms. I have friends and family who are christians, jews, muslims, buddhists, pagans, wiccans and atheists. I've been in apartments and farm houses. Mansions and the projects. I have wined and dined with kings and queens and slept in alleys and dined on pork and beans (thanks, Dusty). But I have never ever EVER seen anyone who owned one of these plates. Not EVER!!!

And yet, somehow the Franklin Mint remains in business to this day! It just doesn't make any sense.

The real shame of it is that they still make this crap and yet they don't offer the TimeLife series of books anymore. How will younger generations learn of John Wesley Hardin and how he once shot a man for snoring too loud.

So who the hell buys these things? Do you know anyone who owns one? If so what plate? And it doesn't just have to be plates. Do you know anyone who owns the coins or chess sets? And if you do, please send them my way and let them know that I am now offering the commemorative edition Chris Maverick Infinity plate. I'm accepting pre-orders today for only $19.95. Each plate is hand crafted and comes with an authentic signed certificate of authenticity. Get one now and pass them along as family heirlooms. Be a part of history today!

Run Juice, Run!!!!

2008-12-06T17:17:28Z

OJ Simpson
The Juice is UNloose!

Kind of amazing, huh? I'm posting two blog-rants in less than 24 hours. There was a time when I posted here each and every day, but these days i center so much on other projects that I'm lucky to post here once a month. That said, I talked about pop culture earlier, and I thought I told an interesting story, so check it out.

Now to the issue at hand. OJ Simpson was sentenced yesterday for his conviction on theft charges. Believe it or not, despite my stance on OJ the murderer, I'm actually ok with the current verdict. Why? Because I actually believe that the two offenses are completely separate and one should have no bearing on the other. Did the Juice break into a building and try to steal some shit? Yes. That's the end of that story. And if that's a crime then let him be punished.

But my problem right now is with the sentencing. The judge yesterday stated that she was sentencing on this crime and this crime alone. Any previous occurrances would have no bearing whatsoever on her decision. She then issued a 33 year sentence for what is essentially a first offense robbery charge. 33 years to a man that by all accounts wasn't even the gunman in the offense. 33 years to a man who by all accounts was robbing from thieves. 33 years to a man who is 61 years old. Effectively a life sentence... for robbery. BULLSHIT!!!

In the hood, if someone steals your shit and you know who has it, you know what yo do? You go and take it back. That's what you do. That's what anyone would do. If you want to argue it's wrong, fine. But seriously 33 years?

SNL made the joke at the beginning of this trial that he was "being tried for armed robbery, but really the murder of 2 people." That is what's happening here. And that is wrong.

I know this isn't going to be popular. beststephi has frequently said about my OJ rants, that "good, I can't feel sorry for that man." But see that's the problem. You should feel sorry for OJ. The man is being railroaded., The justice system only works if it is a system. If it is fair. Lets say OJ did skate on murder charges. Lets say he's a huge asshole who killed his ex-wife and her boyfriend. Let's say he then spent 13 years openly bragging about it and generally being an asshole. Let's say all of that happened. You know what, the justice system should still protect him. The justice system has not protected him here. Not only was the justice system unable to protect him from the initial theft, but it has punished him, and excessively so, for protecting his own interests.

I get it, I know people don't like OJ. I know most people believe he skated on the earier charges. But you know what? None of that should matter. The LA Times should not have a headline that OJ FINALLY goes to jail. And if this is really about justice being served on this particular case then why the fuck is the first person who is interviewed outside of the courtroom by the media Fred Goldman? Fred Goldman is a self-righteous, greedy, opportunistic piece of shit, and what's worse, he's a piece of shit that has absolutely NOTHING to do with this case. Honestly, he really didn't have anything to do with the first OJ case other than inserting himself for his own personal gain. And yet, in this case he's the first person the news goes to when the sentence is read. "Finally," he says, "that S.O.B. is off the streets." Gee Fred, I hope you sleep easier now. I know I do. I feel so much safer knowing that OJ isn't out there prowling the streets murdering people. How did we make it through the last 13 years.

The purpose of the justice system is to protect the people. It is not about revenge. It is not about vengeance. It's about JUSTICE. Or at least its supposed to be. And justice was not served here. The second we start being happy about making an exception because "well, its OJ and he should have gone down 13 years ago" is the second we all lose.

Would it matter if he wasn't black? Would any of this be an issue? I have never for one second believed in Bobby Blake's innocence. Not for a second. And Blake also got off. And you know what happened then? Blake went away. The media just forgot about him. They let him go. Nobody says anything about him and we never see him. In OJs case, people like to blame him for not "going away" but you know what? OJ TRIED to go away. He retired, he moved. He tried to spend the rest of his life in obscurity and Fred Goldman and the media followed him. Yes, OJ became a tabloid magnet, but he didn't really try to be. People always blame him for that, but really, what did he do? He tried to live his life, play golf and hang out with his friends and family. OJ didn't go out clubbing. He didn't hold press conferences. It was the world that wouldn't let OJ go.

I think the world likes to punish black atheletes. Plaxico Burress is an idiot, but does he really deserved three years on an expired permit charge? I mean really? Michael Vick? Dog fighting charges? Ok, it was gross and disgusting and maybe even evil, but people behave as though Vick is the antichrist. The worst human being to walk the earth since... well, since OJ. And what did he do? He did mean things to dogs. Things that in some circles are considered normal. Am I saying it's right? No, its wrong. But it's also excessive.

So yeah, OJ is in jail now. I hope last night everyone was able to sleep easier last night without the spectre of Simpson hanging over our heads. I hope the world has changed to a happy place where birds sing and flowers bloom. Rainbows are flooding the sky. Woohoo. I for one weep for the obvious suspension of our legals system just to appease the bloodlust of the masses.

on HOVA, hooks and hip-hop princesses...

2008-12-05T21:27:17Z

Rihanna
Yep, I'd chop off my arm to hit that...

I haven't really talked about pop culture in a while. I just hadn't really had anything to say. But I've been thinking about something weird the last couple days and thought I'd just rant about it here a little here and see other people's input on the subject.

Have you ever noticed that at any given time there is only one crown princess of hip-hop? Sure, there's lots of female rappers, but that's not really what I mean. In the beginning, back in the day, in the before time, in the long long ago, there was Michel'le. Michel'le was part of the World Class Wreckin' Cru. And by part of, I mean she was fucking Dr. Dre, and someone was like "Dayumm! Dre's girl is hot and can sing, someone should get her to do hooks on this song" and they gave her four lines to repeat over and over again and then had her standing around looking all hot and stuff.

Before you turn off the lights let's get one thing understood
If you plan to make love to me you've got to do it good
Cuz I'm a hell of a woman and for me it takes a hell of man
So don't you dare turn off the lights unless this you understand

It was lightning in a bottle. But much like Dre frequently is, The WCWC was WAY ahead of it's time. Nothing really came of it. Sure there were females in the rap game. You had your Salt-N-Pepa, your MC Lyte, even your Roxanne Shanté, but they were all actually rappers. Then you had your female acts tangentially related to hip-hop: En Vogue, Nia Peeples, Pebbles. But they were more just R&B singers who happened to hang out with Rappers.

And then came Aaliyah. It is my sincere belief that God so loved the world that he saw fit to take the very concept of sexiness and pour it into the fleshbound vessel of a 15 year old girl, whom he allowed to walk the earth. The idea of the hip-hop princess was born.

Hip-Hop had long played with fusion between itself and other music styles, not only with the World Class Wreckin' Cru, but you had the likes of Run-DMC and Aerosmith teaming up. Salt-N-Pepa and En Vogue. Public Enemy and Anthrax. But now, in this earthbound angel, you had the genesis for what would become the standard of the musical style. Get a talented (or at least semi-talented) rapper to spit some rhymes and then toss in hooks by a sexy soul singer. Like I said, lightning in a bottle. And as all of the predictions of the great prophet Phil Spector would come to pass, God is a young black girl who can sing.

Like all messiahs, Aaliyah's time on this earth was very brief and seven years later she was dead. But she made way for others, mere mortals who would fill her void.

In her wake came Brandy, but Brandy didn't have street cred, so she was replaced by Monica. Monica was here for but a cup of coffee and she was in turn replaced by Mýa. Mýa probably could have done ok with her career, but the mighty juggernaut that is Jennifer Lopez decided she was "street" so she changed her named to J-Lo, started using the word "nigga" and took the spot. J-Lo then decided she didn't want to be street anymore and turned her attention to acting (and later back to other non-hip-hop music styles) which left a void. That void would be immediately filled by Ashanti, who actually coined the term "Princess of Hip-Hop" for herself, coronation in the A-T-L and all. The problem was Ashanti, while hot was quite negroid in appearance and so her spot was usurped by Christina Milian, who was just as good a singer and 10 times sexier and more marketable to a caucasian audience. The people being fickle as they are, Milian's album falls from the charts and she was in turn replaced by Ciara. Ciara takes up the baton and runs with it, but then like J-Lo before her, the machine that is Beyoncé simply decides one day that she is the new hip-hop princess and Ciara is banished to obscurity. Again, like J-Lo, Beyoncé bores of the role and looks for more interesting solo opportunities than just singing hooks. Furthermore she decides to get involved with Jay-Z, who secretly is actually the current living avatar of God(-MC) himself. HOVA so loved the world that upon taking Beyoncé for himself, he saw fit to give us a new messiah, and once again took sexiness and made it incarnate and set it upon the earth in a teenaged female form, and thus the world was given Rihanna.

HOVA-damn!

So anyway, my point is, given the popularity of the style, sexy female hooks over street gangsta hip-hop verses, you'd think there'd be a huge market for hook singers. There have always been duets with hot female singers. Everyone from Diana Ross to Britney Spears. From Dolly Parton to Whitney Houston. But in other music styles, any number of females singers can be in demand at one time. Indeed, others like Missy Elliot, Faith Evans, Mary J Blige and even Mariah Carey have attempted to kind of horn in on the action. But it never really works out. They all do better as solo artists, and none of them have ever been as ubiquitous as the princesses I mentioned above. There's even been situations where you'd have a Pop or R&B artist who'd bring a rapper in to spit a verse in the middle of the song. This was the whole base formula behind using the Left-Eye in TLC.

But I find the whole hip-hop princess thing curious. I dunno why, but somehow the fact that there is only one at any given time just makes it seem more magical. That and I'm pretty sure that the tears of Rihanna can actually cure disease.

So does anyone have any idea why that is? Also, jameel and I were talking about all this yesterday, and I think I've been able to trace the entire lineage back as far as it goes, but did I miss anyone? Did it not really originate with Aaliyah? And does this phenomenon happen in any other music style? Or for that matter any other art style at all?

on how Obama ruined my gay wedding...

2008-11-07T09:02:51Z

Day 281: Wishful Thoughts.
Originally uploaded by SaylaMarz.

I had it all figured out. It was very simple really. First I was going to get a sex change. Then once I was a girl I was going to move to San Francisco and become a lesbian. Then I was going to convince my friend, see_me_naked, aka Sayla Marz, aka Brigid, to come there and marry me. We'd be one big happy lesbian family with tons of little lesbian kids running around (I could freeze my sperm before the operation). What could be better than that?

Only then Prop 8 passed and ruined all my plans. Now I'm just going to have to stay a dude. Sorry Brigid.

Actually, Brigid and I had been talking about Prop 8 a lot the last couple weeks before the election. She has this whole vested interest in it what with being one of them there gays and all.

I didn't really say it, but I was pretty sure that Prop 8 would pass right from the beginning. Actually, to be honest, I'm amazed it came as close to being voted down as it did.

Brigid said something to me the night after the election. She couldn't believe that in a world that's come so far as to finally elect a black president, people could still be so hateful and vindictive as to deny the basic civil right of being able to love another person. I've heard similar arguments from other friends, both straight and gay alike over the last couple days. So I've been sitting around and kind of thinking about it and trying to sort my feelings out about it.

I think I've made my feelings on gay marriage pretty clear. My personal plan was to make an amendment not only abolishing gay marriage, but the whole legal definition of marriage, period. From then on, marriage would be an entirely socio-religious concept and the state would ONLY support civil unions. But I'm a visionary like that.

But most of the world isn't full of free thinking, Jay-Z worshiping, dark-skinned Chinamen like myself. If it were, gay marriage wouldn't be an issue. Nor would racism, illegal drugs, or prostitution. One day, I'll be in charge of the world, and like the great Victor von Doom, I will rule with a firm but fair iron fist, and turn this world into a utopia heretofore unimagined by man. And you will all love it, under penalty of death.

Anyway, as I was telling Brigid, the problem with Prop 8 is it really is what the people want. If you're an alien who comes down from space and moves in with me for a month to learn about the human race, you'd probably come to believe that we're a bunch of sexually uninhibited, hedonistic, morally blurry, atheistic liberals who like to smoke pot in between bisexual orgies and the resulting abortions. But in real life that's not the case. In real life, humans are pretty much self-righteous, selfish, shortsighted pricks. People don't like that which that they don't understand. They fight to maintain the status quo.

Racism didn't just go away. We didn't just happen upon a black president. It took 100 years to get from the freeing of the slaves to the civil rights march on Washington DC. And it took another 45 after that to elect a black president. And you know what? This country is still full of a bunch of racist fucks. Change is slow.

And that's just the thing. Homosexuality has been around since forever. And yeah, gays have been oppressed forever. But really, I'd argue that homosexuality has only been mainstream for about a decade or so, and then only barely. You can't short circuit change. Will the gays get there? Sure, but it's not going to happen over night, and it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better. As sad and awful as it sounds to say, you don't get a Barack Obama in the White House without stepping over the bridge built by the bullet riddled bodies of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X along the way.

This country just isn't ready for gay marriage yet. And it can't be forced down the country's throat. That just breeds resentment and makes it worse. Of course it needs to happen, because without that resentment the change will never come.

But it's going to be a long slow road. You want proof?

You want to know what helped Obama win? Black people. By all accounts black people came out in record numbers to vote for the black guy. And it worked. It put the black guy over the top. BUT, if you look at the California exit polls you'll see something interesting. 70% of those black people also voted for Prop 8. Why? Because niggers hate faggots.

Ironic, isn't it?

But like I said, people fucking suck.

People will fight this. And well they should. Change will never come if they don't. But it's not going to be an easy fight, and I firmly believe that the wrong battle is being fought. The problem with fighting for equality, the problem with the argument "I'm just like you" is that the truth is, you're not. All people are different, and differences are ok. Trying to say that a gay marriage is just like a hetero one is a losing battle, because there's always going to be obvious differences. What really needs to happen is the world needs to realize that a gay marriage, while different is still a valid institution. And that won't happen without a change of attack. And even then, it won't happen overnight.

Unless we elect me ruler....

Under penalty of death.

on assumptions of my social opinions...

2008-10-18T17:39:32Z

10-17-08
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

These days, I do most of my blogging over at 365mav. It was my idea when I started 365, that I'd use it as a daily journal of my life and I'd reserve chrismaverick for my rants about general life and politics and such. Stuff that wasn't specifically about me. In practice though, my rants are usually inspired by something that happens in my daily life so I end up ranting over there, and then having to copy the rant over here so as not to bother with writing it twice.

This is one of those days.

Day 798 of 365 Again.

Sometimes people just can't read. Welcome to the internet.

I received not one, but two messages today letting me know that my Day 68 photo was linked on some website by someone woman having to do with men's bad ideas.

The gist of of both people's messages was that the woman links to pics without their permission. While they have a point, I've long since accepted that being on the internet, posting pictures, means that inevitably, people are going to use my shit without my permission. Really, it happens all the time. Some could argue it's fair use. Some could argue it's copyright infringement, but it's clear that in 2008, the laws about what you can and can't do with someone else's picture just don't keep up with the way reality works. I just accept it. In a perfect world, I'd be getting some kind of royalties everytime someone uses my stuff. The world is not perfect. Que sera, que sera.

What's funny is the context in which the image is being used. Some woman is using my photo to illustrate that threesomes are bad ideas (as well as using other photos to illustrate other "male" ideas are bad).

I don't pretend that I'm perfect, or that I make sense all the time. But I am pretty forthcoming with my beliefs, as crazy and fucked up as they may be. I write about them all the time. And if you're paying attention, you might be able to guess that I totally don't have a problem with the concept at all (while that isn't actually what that picture was about).

Funny story. Last year, around Christmas, I was at Walmart standing in the express line to buy a pack of cigarrettes. The woman in front of me was looking through tabloids while she waited, and one had a picture of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt on the cover. She turned to me and started complaining about them. "I just don't get this Angelina Jolie thing. Men like her they must be crazy."

Now a little backstory. Unlike, apparently, 99.9999% of my gender I don't find Angelina Jolie hot. Don't get me wrong. She's not ugly or anything. She's even kind of pretty. But I don't think she's especially sexier than maybe 100 other women that i know in real life. She's the kinda chick that if I saw her at the club, I'd be like "oh, ummm... yeah, I guess she's kinda cute." and then I'd probably go back to my drink. It's not like I'd be like "Dayumn! I have to ask her to dance." So I figured, "oh, this woman feels the same way about her as me." and I mumbled a half hearted "yep" to her. I guess she took this as approval to enter a full fledged conversation with me, and began ranting.

"I mean, she's just disgusting. I don't see why Brad stays with her. You know, she does it with other women. That's just gross. It's wrong. It's disgusting. Why anyone would think twice about her, knowing she's into that sort of thing is beyond me."

I just kind of stared at her while she was ranting about the grossness of Angelina's lesbian dalliances and finally when I could tell she was looking to me for validation I said, "ummm, sorry lady. You got the wrong guy." She turned away in a huff and then we ignored each other.

It shouldn't surprise anyone at this point to know that my views on sex are EXTREMELY liberal. You want to fuck people of the same gender. Good for you. You want to fuck the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys all at once, again... I say go you. Hell, you enjoy giving head to barnyard animals, well... so long as the animals don't complain, who am I to stand in your way. If you're a good old fashioned, sex only for procreation, in the bounds of marriage and anything but the missionary position makes the baby Jesus cry. Well, I say you're missing out on all the great homosexual orgies with livestock, but hey, so long as you're happy, it's none of my business.

But really, what is it about my face that makes people just assume that I'd agree with them on whatever. It's not even just sex. People never really ask me "who do you support for president?" Liberals assume I'd go with Obama. Conservatives assume I'd go with McCain. I mean, I'd totally get the "oh, he's a black guy, he must be an Obama guy" thing, but it's not just that way. People just think I must feel the way they do.

Bt especially with sex. I've had gay people assume I'm gay. I've had polyamorous people assume I'm poly. And the straight, monogamous people just assume I'm one of them. Really I don't mind one way or the other, first impressions are what they are. But if you actually took the time to read anything I write ever (or worse, have a conversation with me for like more than 10 min.) it should really be pretty evident that about politics, sex, drugs, crime, religion, homosexuality and most other social issues... I'm pretty much fucking nuts.

So uh, yeah... If you're trying to blog about traditional values and linking to me... "ummm, sorry lady, you got the wrong guy!"

Can I get a "Woah Bundy!"

365 days

an open reply to racists who read my blogs.

2008-09-07T04:48:40Z

9-6-08
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

I hadn't used my livejournal in quite some time. 365mav and Cosmic Hellcats have been taking up so much of my time lately. But I had been wanting to change that. I had been wanting to find the time to find a topic that gave me something good to rant about here (as opposed to 365mav where I talk about my life, I like to keep this space reserved for just crazy ranting and stuff.

Only today I kinda did that ranting in my 365 shot. It went on a lot longer than I intended it to and I thought it might be a nice little thing to put here and represent my (hopeful) return to bloggerdom. So here you go.

Day 757 of 365 Again.

I got a comment from a flickr member, the other day. I opened and read it, it said they were suckers.

Apologies to Chuck D.

So yesterday, I got a comment on an alternate 365 photo from my first year. It's a picture of me hanging out with Steph and two other girls in bikinis in a river. The comment is reprinted below for posterity:

three white girls with a black guy. that's even worse than one white girl with a black guy. blacks are so blah in the looks department.

A couple minutes later, he apparently felt the need to comment again and added:

even just ot have their picture taken with them it's disgusting. gross gross gross. I don't see what white women in see in black men or what white men see in black women. you see more white women with black men than you do white men with black women, that just goes to show that white men are the smartest of the lot. or at least have better taste and sense.

Despite the lack of grammar beyond a second grade level, I was reasonably able to parse it. It seems our friend no likey a fine nubian hunk of manhood like myself seducing his Caucasian womenfolk into fornication with the power of my mysterious ebon skin and sheer fortitude of my 12 inch African manroot.

I felt the need to respond to his inquiry, and did so in as polite a manner as I could muster:

you know, if you're so much smarter and superior then how come I'm fucking three of your women?"

Just call me "Mavdingo!"

I had several friends jump to my defense, not that I really need it of course. Some told me to turn the other cheek. That's not my style either. Steph suggested I respond making fun of his grammar. Nope. That's not how I roll. See, for me, it's all about the honesty.

So let me break it down for you people. There's no sense keeping the secret any longer.

The blacks are taking over.

Yes, I know the white man has long considered us inferior. I know with the ebonics and the rap music and well, Urkel, you assume that we are a lesser class of being, put here to be mocked and spat upon.

But we are not. Watch your sports. We have been dominating there for years. We started with baseball, football and basketball. The basics. Something we could dominate without you paying much attention. Afterall, you bred the black man to be a slave. Naturally his gifts are more suited to the barbaric world of sport. Just look at boxing, it is full of warrior negroes. The very type that in simpler times would plow your fields. Simple barbaric sports. The ones that the negro might be able to amuse himself with in "the ghetto."

But while you weren't looking we moved on. The finest golf player on the planet today is a black man. The two most dominating tennis players are african american sisters, and yet there are no golf courses or tennis courts in "the hood." Haven't you ever wondered if somehow the domination of the negro is spreading?

You're right, it is.

You see, many years ago, we had a meeting. We felt that over four hundred years of slavery and oppression was enough. We felt that it was past time to give the white man his just recourse. The golden age of honkitude must give way like the stone age before it. The rise of the black man is upon us.

We were each given jobs. We would infiltrate the arts, the sciences, atheletics and politics. Every year there would simply be more and more of us. Until finally, in the 22nd century, the white man would be but a humble servant to his nubian masters.

Did you think it an accident that all of a sudden a black man is a hairs breath away from your presidency? HAHAHAHAHAH!!! Foolish Crackers!!!!

My job is that of breeder. You see, unlike your foolish aryan ancestors who sought to separate and segregate what they believed to be a lesser being from their populace, the advanced negro mind realizes the folly of that plan. You see, in order for the culture to grow strong, we must embrace the diversity of all races. For only then can the true genetic superman come to pass. Yes, we are the superior race, but if we are to evolve even further... well to put it in simple terms that even you can understand... we need your whiteness.

That's where I come in. My assignment, as one of the most genetically gifted and virile of my kind is to pass my seed amongst your womanfolk. This accomplishes two tasks. First there is the obvious benefit of the production of offspring who will be the alphas amongst the new world order.

But in addition, once your women have been thoroughly pleasured, and for the first time satisfied to levels of ecstasy they will become docile to our cause. Not only will they not have the energy to aide your resistance after six hours of strenuous intercourse, but so satisfied will they be that they will cease copulation with the sexually and pigmentally challenged males of their own race. You see, it is true. Once you go black, you do not go back.

So why do I admit this now. After all these many years, is it simply one ignorant troll upon flickr that has caused us to abandon our clandestine plan. Not at all. The hapless troglodyte merely managed to be in the right place at the right time. This is much bigger than him. It is much bigger than us all.

You see, we need your help. Back when the wheels were set in motion, we planned for all conceivable obstacles that might arise. However, in even the best laid plans, there are bumps in the road. We have hit one of those bumps.

The Hispanics.

The hispanics happened upon our plans barely a decade ago, and decided to try and out do us. Somehow they have managed to multiply their forces with even greater expeditiousness than we negroes can. They must be stopped.

I can no longer afford to seduce and fornicate with caucasian women one at a time. For efficiency we must now fornicate with you in groups of three or more. Preferably at least 5 at a time, or we shall never get through you all. So if white women shall kindly start taking numbers and lining up outside my door, I shall get to you as quickly as possible.

And don't you people get any ideas about trying to revolt and fight back. It is over for the white race. You are but dinosaurs on your way to extinction. Except it graciously and with honor. All that is left for you is to decide. Who is it that you really want to inherit the earth?

The niggers or the beaners?

I thought so.

So now, Who wants to sex Mavdingo?!?!?

365 days

Mav and Max present Hellcats at art show

2008-05-13T08:09:11Z

Max and I are going to be appearing at the "Good and Evil" show at Pittsburgh's Creative Treehouse displaying photos from the Hellcats photoshoot as well as the comic.

If you're in Pittsburgh or near here, by all means stop by and buy a print or a signed book. Should be a blast.

This is an 18 and over show, and BYOB. There will be live bands. I've presented my photography at these shows before and they're generally quite fun. So if you're not busy Saturday night then please come on by.

And if you are busy. Well, cancel your plans. We're much cooler than whatever you were going to be doing anyway.

When: May 17, 2008
Where: Creative Treehouse
517 Lincoln Avenue
Bellevue, PA 15202
www.creativetreehousepgh.com
Time: 8pm to 12am
Cost: $5
18 and Over Show
BYOB w/proper ID

Hope to see you there.

PS: If you aren't reading our webcomic yet, then what the hell is wrong with you?

on hellcats and ... well... going to hell, or heaven, I guess...

2008-05-05T07:23:20Z

5-4-08
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

so I don't normally copy my 365mav shots here, seeing as how there already is another place for them. But I'm really wondering what people are thinking about this one, and its a great excuse to pimp my new webcomic so what the hell?

Anyway, from today's 365 shot:

Day 632 of 365 More.

This will probably be one of those rants that I love doing that will probably piss a lot of people off, so before I get to that, I guess it would make sense if I got the other stuff out of the way.

Saw Iron Man today. Even thought about doing a shot commemorating it, but I've been busy with other stuff and didn't get to it. Anyway, good movie. I enjoyed it. And I'm the kinda guy who always sits through all the credits of a movie, no matter what I go to see. I'm glad I am. So if you're not the kinda person who reads all the credits, I suggest you do this time.

I also got episode 2 of Cosmic Hellcats up. We're only two episodes in, so if you haven't been following along, it's pretty easy to catch up. How's that for a cheap plug.

Ok, so now on to the rant.

Steph and I went for a walk through our local graveyard after we got back from the movies today. It's kinda weird. We live closer to a graveyard (actually three) than we do to any park, so sometimes we go there to walk and jog and stuff.

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm kinda non-traditional about death rituals. Like I don't go to funerals, for instance. No matter how much I loved the person in life. They're just not my gig. The whole concept of hanging out with the body is kinda creepy. The person isn't in there. It's just meat. Dead meat, to be crass. There's absolutely no reason to be all creepy and hang out with it. It just depresses everyone. I hate being depressed. I'm depressed enough as it is. When I die, I'd rather you all go out and have a drink in my honor. Maybe go out and have hot monkey sex. Hell, watch one of my favorite movies. You know... do something I enjoyed. Nobody enjoys funerals. And if you do... ewww!

So anyway, while we were walking around, it occurred to me what a colossal waste of space and rescources graveyards are. I don't know how long it takes a body to decompose, but I don't think its that long really. Certainly not in the grand scheme of eternity. So why do we waste valuable land space on storing dust.

I guess I get that some people like visiting the grave site. I don't understand it, but I get it. It seems like some people feel closer to their relatives after they're gone and uh... stand there and look at the six feet of dirt, grass and weeds laying on top of them. Ok, yeah, that's weird, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

But how long does that go on? I mean, I admit, I don't really understand it because I don't do it. I loved my grandfather more than I can possibly even begin to say, but i've never seen his grave. I don't want to see it, because its, well... not him... its a bunch of dirt over where what's left of him was buried. I'd rather remember him as a guy who drank beer and fished than a guy buried in a hole.

But even if I did care about such things, I can't imagine that my future children will care. Because they never actually met him. So why would they want to look at the mound of dirt over him. And what about their children. And their children's children? I'm betting they couldn't give a damn.

So that's the weird thing. I'm walking around and I come across tombstones for people who died in the mid-1800s. 1891, 1883, 1874, 1868! These are people who have been dead well over 100 years. Everyone who ever knew them are dead. No one is coming to visit these graves. Right? They're just taking up space. Some of them a whole lot of space! Giant pillars! Mausoleums! Who does that?

I mean, am I wrong? Does anyone go to visit the graves of their ancestors they don't know?

And then there's the really sad one. John So-and-so, Loving Husband, 1821-1865. Martha So-and-so, Loving WIfe, 1842-____. You know what that means? I bet you a million dollars that Martha ain't still walking the earth today at the tender age of 166. John was all proud that he found himself a young hot wife. Was with her for a couple years, met a tragic early end, but had prepared a family plot for them, then Martha went on to remarry and decided to have herself buried somewhere else. Leaving John to look like he's been stood up on a date throughout eternity. Sad. So very sad.

I mean, who does that anyway? I can almost understand buying a funeral plot with your spouse while you're still alive. A bit morbid, but ok, I get it. When someone dies, the planning and arranging is kinda hard, especially in the survivors state of mind. Best to get as much out of the way ahead of time as possible.

But who the hell writes their name on the stone while they're still alive?!?! That's the sickest thing I've ever heard. There were some stones where both people were still alve. Tom and Nancy McGullicutty. 1965-___ and 1963-____. What the fuck is wrong with you people?

Maybe I'm the weird one here. Maybe I just don't get it. But seriously, when I go, I hope you people have the decency to turn me into Soylent and feed the starving children or something.

Enjoy the comic.

365 days

on comicon and cosmic hellcats...

2008-04-25T04:31:55Z

4-23-08
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

If you haven't been following 365mav (and you should be, as I write there everyday) you might not know that I wrote a comic book. Well I did. And Pittsburgh Comicon is tomorrow.... max1975 and I will be there selling the book and signing copies and stuff like that.

The comic is based on four of the girls who have modeled for me, and on Saturday and Sunday, they'll be joining us in our booth to sell and sign books as well. We'll also have prints and posters of the girls for sale and we'll even have t-shirts. Som come. Spend money. Buy stuff. Make a long line so that we don't seem foolish sitting next to Sal Buscema.

And if you're not local and can't make the con, you should still buy the book because its awesome. It really is. I'm not just saying that cuz I wrote it. And if you want extra super duper total awesomeness then buy the portfolio edition graphic novel same great story, but on really nice paper and with extra bonus pics of all the real life girls.

Come on, help a brotha out. I'm but a poor starving artist who wants to eat next month.

on blissful political ignorance...

2008-04-15T16:57:59Z

4-7-08
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

So, due to some accounting errors in the way taxes were deducted from my paycheck, I owed the city of Pittsburgh some money this year. Not a whole lot of money, but about $400. So seeing as how I'd rather the $400 be in my bank account than the Man's, I waited til the last minute to pay them.

So on my lunch break, I walked over to the post office to mail in my return and the check. On my way out of the post office I was stopped by an elderly woman who was protesting tax law,

Woman: Excuse me! Would you like to know how the government spends your tax dollars?
Me: Ummm, no... I most certainly do not.

I wish I had a camera on me for that one. I was in a rush, so I left my camera bag in my office. That'll teach me. I guess I could have used my iPhone. Oh well.

I hope I wasn't too rude. I mean, I gotta figure when you're protesting you get blown off by people a lot meaner than me. Really though, I'm depressed enough as it is. I really don't need to hear about how my $400 bucks (actually a lot more than that, when you take into account all the taxes that WERE taken out last year) is going to support some cause I probably don't believe in.

All the more reason for you people to elect me ruler. Under my administration your relatively meager yearly taxes will go to good roads, clean air, universal healthcare and a chambermaid in every home. And for all you negro families out there, who are still waiting for the reparations promised your ancestry. I'm there for you. Forty acres and a mule, baby!

"But Emperor Mav! Despite horrible atrocities of the past, we have not enough land to furnish every black family with 40 acres!"

I hear you, and I understand. And like everything else, my cabinet has a plan to help you out. I'm not quite ready to talk about the details, but let me just leave you with this teaser:

"MARS BITCHEZ!"

on teens and technology...

2008-03-26T05:36:42Z

Red Light District: Text Sex
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

So I went to Easter dinner with Steph and her family, and while there, here cousin (who I think is like 14) was admiring my new iPhone. In typical teen fashion, she immediately started begging her parents for one. Her mother told her to stop and she's lucky they finally agreed to let her have a cellphone at her age.

This sparked a conversation as to whether or not it was appropriate for teens to have cell phones. Steph's other cousin (a school teacher) then went off on a tangent about how kids shouldn't have phones because they are the bane of schools. She said she confiscates more phones from kids than anything else because they aren't supposed to have them on during school hours.

I actually found this kinda disturbing. I'm actually pretty against the concept of schools being able to confiscate anything. Simply put. Shit doesn't belong to them, they shouldn't take shit. But also, I thought after Columbine and 9/11 all the rules had changed anyway. I'm totally okay with saying that kids aren't allowed to make phone calls during class, but dammit, its fucking 2008. If I have a 14 year old kid, I want to be able to get in touch with him/or on 2 seconds notice anytime I want. Period. You want to make a rule that they can't be on the phone during class. Fine. You want to give them detention if they break it. Fine. But if you take property from my kids that I bought for them, you can expect the police to come a-calling.

Anyway, this went on and eventually the cousin revealed that she takes away more cell phones during lunch than any other time. During lunch? What the fuck!?! Who cares if a kid is on the phone during lunch. Well apparently, its against the rules to have phones turned on during school hours at all. And since lunch is during school hours that counts. I pointed out that that was a dumb rule. She said, but its the rule so it has to be followed I always hate that logic. I got over blindly following rules that didn't make sense when I was like 2 years old. I sure as hell wasn't doing it when I was 14.

Anyway, her rationale was that kids are on the phone and myspace and such way too often anyway, and she'd much rather they use their lunch break to learn face to face social communication because that is more likely to help them in the real world.

BULLSHIT!

I've lived in the real world for quite a while now. In fact, there is nothing more I would like in the world than to crawl back into the nice comfy world of academia and never have to leave again. That said, I can tell you without a doubt that in the real world, in 2008, face-to-face communication isn't worth shit. What you need to survive in the real world is a healthy understanding of cellphones and email. That's how the world turns. And I don't think that's going away anytime soon.

So anyway, that's the question. For everyone, but especially those of you with kids. Do teens need cell phones? And if they have cellphones what should be the policy of schools regarding them? Do you think its bad that kids are communicating virtually so often now? Do you think that at 14 or 15 a kid still needs to be "learning to socialize face-to-face?" Or do you feel like I do, that they are trying to apply old rules to a society that no longer works the way they think it does. In my view, it didn't even work that way then. But whatever.

Anyway, how do you feel?

EDIT: sui66iy posted a link tothis article which is a good take on the situation.

on scarring your children for life... (but in a cool GenX kinda way)

2008-02-25T05:54:10Z

The Dahm Triplets
One is married to Dr. Phil's kid.
No accounting for taste.

So the other day, beststephi and I were watching the TV show, 1 vs. 100. For those who have never seen it, the base premise is that one contestant competes in trivia questions against a mob of 100 contestants for a chance to win $1million. If the contestant ever gets a question wrong, then the mob splits whatever money the contestant would have won. The mob includes a bunch of regular people, who change from game to game, and some celebrities (I use that term loosely), who stay for the whole season and play for chairity. In actuality, the mob has 102 people in it, because one of the celebrities is the Dahm Triplets, who play as a unit as one mob member.

For some reason, I decided to look up the Wikipedia entry for the sisters (not really sure why, they look anything but hot on the show, though the internet proves them to be much better looking) and I found something that I can't decide if it's disturbing or not. Apparently, two of the three twins have tattoos. Why are tattoos disturbing, well, they're not really. But in this case, its the circumstance. When the twins were born their parents had one of them tattooed with a small dot on her ass. Another has two small dots. And one was left uninked. The parents used these markings to distinguish which was which when they were babies.

For some reason, that just seems like the weirdest craziest thing I've ever heard. I don't really know why. I know a lot of people in the modern day and age are against (male) circumcision of newborns. I still know others who are against the piercing of the ears of little girls. Neither of those things really bother me though. Yet, the very concept of tattooing a kid for recognition, even in a relatively innocuous way like that just seems crazy to me. I asked Steph, and she seemed to think it wasn't that big a deal, especially since the markings aren't really visible (the twins were Playboy Playmates, jointly in December 1998. I spent some time scouring the internets "researching" nekkid pictures of them, and I can't see the dots for the life of me), but something about it still bothers me.

So I ask you oh blogosphere. Is this crazy? If you had triplets would you do that to them? Would you pick somewhere less potentially embarrasing than the ass? The sole of the foot came to mind for me. And how do you decide which of the three girls to spare? As I've thought about it, it occured to me that if I were going to do it, I'd probably at least pick something cooler than dots, so as the girls grew older and began sexing it up or appearing in Playboy (which they did at the SUGGESTION of their father) it would look like they did it on purpose. Maybe a little heart on one's ass, a star on another and for the third (since I wouldn't want to leave someone out), I dunno... something simple... like a portrait of Harry S. Truman.

And how does this compare to regular customs. Is it barbaric to circumsize a kid? How about piercing their ears? Or is it ok to tattoo a baby just for fun. Maybe its a good idea to tattoo all of your kids with their names across their forehead for easy identification should they ever get misplaced or kidnapped.

Of course, once we start barcoding everyone this will all be moot.

on glamorous fairy tales...

2008-01-18T21:28:56Z

1-4-08
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

so, if you've been following 365mav, then you probably already know that I collected the first year of self-portraits together in a nice little coffee table book, which everybody should totally buy because, like I want to be famous and stuff.

Anyway, playing with blurb and self-publishing, I found that I really liked it and I really liked the coffee table book format and I started trying to think what else I could do with it. Eventually, I came up with this idea of having a coffee table book of maybe 20 glamorized fairy tales. Spoofs on Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella and hat not. Not really pornographic per se, But adult oriented and sensualized in the same way that most of my photography is. I've talked to a couple models about it and people seem excited by it.

Anyway, I had lunch with max1975 today and he thought it was a cool idea and expressed interest in helping me write it. Honestly it had never occurred to me before to even ask anyone else to write it with me. I kind of thought of it as "my thing." I'm REALLY sure that I don't want to share the photography, but I'm torn on the writing.

So here are my questions for people:

Do you even think its a cool idea? Would you buy something like this? How much would you pay for it?
What fairy tales should I be sure to include?
Do you think I should write it myself or share the writing with other people?
If you're a writer, would you be interested in writing a story for it?
If you're a model, would you be interested in modeling for it? (Unlike the Tarot thing, I don't think I need a gazillion different people, and in fact, I think it might even be funny if like Prince Charming was the same guy in every fairytale.
Should I just have like one picture for each story or a couple and try to illustrate different scenes?
How long should it be? I was thinking maybe 20 short stories, like a page or two each. Would it be better if the stories were more... story length? Should there be more or less than 20?

And any other input people think is important I'd love to hear too. I'm pretty excited about this one. Geeze, I have way too much going on.

Oh yeah, quick plug, come to my show tomorrow night. You know you want to.

Come see my gallery show

2008-01-08T02:42:42Z

stu and jameel black and light 2
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

I was invited to do another photography show at the Creative Treehouse. This time the theme is "light" and I've been taking pictures for a photoset there. I'd like to invite anyone who's going to be in Pittsburgh on Jan. 19th to come out and see it. I'm quite happy wiht what I've produced so far for it. Some of my best work ever. The press release for the show is below.

Lights! A Photographic Exploration

Bellevue, PA, January 2nd, 2008 — Lights! is a photographic exploration featuring photographic work from local photographers. From natural to controlled, light is all around us from the source of the sun to the simplicity of a light bulb, but there are many and various sources of light around us from day to day. This show puts photographers in a world of never ending light sources to capture their best representation of light. So join in on the fun for an event featuring the works of John E. Bodnar, Sarah Higgins, Chris Maverick, Dawn Zacharias, Sarah Hindman, Lucinda Wiebe, Michelle Mitchell, Michael Flaherty, Dustin McGrew, John Altdorfer, Tamara Barker, Christina Labrise , Jeff Zoet, and Marta Heberle.

Music provided by Andrew James formerly of Dodging August (www.myspace.com/dodgingaugust), the Shutouts (www.myspace.com/theshutouts412), the Jim Dandies (www.myspace.com/thejimdandiesmusic), and the Dream Intended (www.myspace.com/thedreamintended).

When: January 19, 2008

Time: 7:30PM to 12AM

Price: $5 at the Door, BYOB with Proper ID, All Ages

Food & Beverages:

Non-Alcoholic Drinks and Appetizers will be provided.

For additional information, Contact:

Jesse Hambley

Creative TreeHouse

517 Lincoln Ave., 2nd floor

Bellevue, PA 15202

724-910-9947

info@CreativeTreeHousePgh.com

http://www.myspace.com/creativetreehouse

on looking for models for another photo project...

2007-12-09T18:05:26Z

3-11-07
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

So I've been invited to do another photography show. This time the theme is "Light."

I know I'm still not done with the tarot project (and yes, I'm still working on it). But I had a great idea this morning for how I could really do something awesome for this show, and since this show has more of a deadline (the show is Jan. 15), I need to find some people who don't mind posing nude and having those photos displayed in a gallery. They'd be similar to what you're looking at here of me. Depending on your comfort, some may be more explicit than others, but I definitely don't want to show anyone's face in anything.

So, anyone interested?

EDIT: By the way, I'm looking for both genders.

on may-december romances and karaoke with strippers...

2007-11-20T08:06:11Z

American Beauty
If you're gonna have a midlife crisis,
you might as well do it right.

The other day, Steph and I were playing Scruples with friends when I was given a pretty interesting question. The premise was that if I get divorced, would I invite my new girlfriend to spend the night with me while my adolescent children were home. This transgressed into a conversation about how as I'd be in my mod 40s, my new girlfriend was likely around 19, which led to my commenting about how one of my life goals is to bed an 18 year old once I turn 36, just because there's something magical about banging someone half your age.

Amazingly, I am still in a relationship.

Anyway, Steph and Kim stated that they thought it was wrong for someone in their 40s to be dating a teenager. George and I maintained that while a little out of the ordinary there was nothing specifically wrong with it. Obviously one could look at the breakdown of our little survey of four and determine that, well... men are pigs. This may be true, but I actually had a little more logic to it than that. The girls theorized that because of the age difference between say, a 43 year old man and a 19 year old woman, the two could never have a compatible enough life experience to have a relationship and that it could only be about raunchy, dirty, unbridled sex and that that was slimy. While I have no problem with basing a relationship on raunchy, dirty, unbridled sex, I personally feel that assuming two people aren't right for each other because of their ages is just as prejudiced as assuming they can't be together because of their races, religions or genders. It just seems wrong to me. Maybe the 19 year old is amazingly mature. Maybe the 43 year old is amazingly immature. Maybe neither and they're just people.

I've always heard the "rule" that you should only date people who are older than half your age plus seven. But does that really hold true? So I'm wondering, how do other people feel about this sort of thing.

Also, Pittsburgh people: I've decided to get a group of people together for some post-Thanksgiving karaoke on Friday. Not just karaoke, BAREOKE! At the Tennyson Lodge. Basically, its karaoke while strippers dance around you. Its great fun. Anyone else interested in going with us? (men and women welcome, of course)

on sex as performance art and science!!!

2007-11-13T07:37:58Z

Sarah laying
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

Those who follow my daily musings over in 365mav may remember that a few weeks ago, retrospection_ and I had our Hollywood debut a couple weeks ago on the set of the movie Adventureland that was filming at a local amusement park here. For you non A-listers out there who have never starred in a major Hollywood film release, I have to tell you that a shooting day on a movie set is VERY long. It's especially long when your entire part pretty much consists of walking back and forth holding hands and eating stale popcorn while less gifted actors who have to rely on "spoken lines" to get the pathos of their scenes across perform take after take even though you nailed your own mark each and everytime. We are true professionals like that.

Anyway, seeing as how we had plenty of time on our hands, Sarah and I had the opportunity to discuss a great many things that we have in common. After we had talked about football, movies, music and planned our next photo project, the topic of conversation of course turned to sex (because I'm so damn hot, you see). Sarah told me about a conversation she had with friends of hers about the way people behave when they're having sex. Namely, she theorized that while having sex you are in essence always "performing" for the other person.

Her theory is based around the premise that the sounds you make while fucking, from the moans to the dirty talk are all learned and not actually natural. While she accepted that some physical reaction is of course innate, she believed that the majority of the things people say or do is based on subconscious emulation of porn stars and isn't so much a biological of your own body as it is an attempt to entice and turn-on your partner.

I think the idea showed some merit, however I think its kind of a simplification. Everything I've learned about science from watching Mythbusters has taught me that before I can really understand the science of an event I have to break it down and go small scale. So, let's take sex out of the equation for a moment and examine a simpler response to stimuli. Raise your right foot off the ground about 18-24 inches, position it directly over left foot and swiftly and decisively stomp down as hard as you can. I would submit that in all likelihood upon contact between your feet you found yourself involuntarily screaming something to effect of "OW," "OUCH," or perhaps "MOTHERFUCKER!" Even if there was no one in your immediate vicinity, you probably made the same exclamation. So you aren't really screaming for the benefit of a second party so much as involuntarily verbally expressing a response to stimuli agnostic to audience.

Now find an infant child. I wouldn't use a newborn (we're not savages here); any child from about 6 weeks to 18 months will probably do. Now provide a similar pain stimulus to the foot of the child (again, as we are not savages, it is not necessary to stomp from the full 18 inches, 6-8 should do nicely). I surmise, that the child will have a similar verbal response to pain, however the response will likely come in the form of an unintelligible scream of some sort.

What we can learn from these experiments is that not only is the human response to pain innate, but the specific expressions used to convey that pain are learned. The infant does not know the words ow, ouch or motherfucker yet expresses pain verbally nonetheless. The adult on the other hand uses those terms regardless of audience. I therefore postulate that even though expressive terms to intense physical stimuli are learned, their use is involuntary to a large extent nonetheless.

Now leaving our small scale experiment we can again turn to the full scale problem of sex. I'd argue that while Sarah is right, and a large part of the sexual act, from lingerie, mood setting and makeup to positioning, foreplay and movement and even to verbalizations is designed to entice the other partner, and while I will also accept that a large portion of it is learned, the degree to which it is internalized is so severe that it is effectively indistinguishable from any other sexual response that is written into our genetic code. Yelling out a nice heavy "ohmigodohmigodohmigodimgonnacum!!!" is just as instinctive as contractions of the vaginal walls or penis.

Obviously, much like physical orgasmic response varies from individual ro individual, verbal response will vary as well. And again, much like physical actions during the sex act are intentionally performed (I don't think there's a genetic marker that tells someone to bite down on their partner's neck and shove an 18 inch vibrator up their ass at "just the right time"), some verbal responses are of course done intentionally and deliberately for the benefit of the second party (or perhaps third party observers). I don't dispute that. However, I don't think the responses can be simplified to the point that we can consider it a performance per se.

So anyway, like always, I want to know what you think. So give me your thoughts. Or give us your thoughts I should say. As I know Sarah is quite curious to hear what people think too. I originally promised her that I'd post this rant a month ago when we first had the conversation. It's quite possible that I misrepresented her opinions through the haze of memory somewhere here as well. She's welcome to correct me, and hopefully she'll respond to your comments as well with her thoughts as I will.

In the interest of science, I am willing to explore this further. As such, I'd like to have say, 20 female subjects, 10 of whom are porn fans, 10 of whom have never seen any, volunteer to have sex with me on video tape so that we can examine the results and present the findings in a followup journal article. The world is counting on us people. In the meantime, I'd just love to hear what people think.

on Not These Niggaz Again...

2007-10-17T11:32:35Z

9-7-07
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

Note: Originally I was going to use the title "on EFIL4ZAGGIN" but I used it back on Nov 29th, 2006 so I decided to change it up a bit.

This weekend, Bill Cosby and Alvin F. Poussaint were on Meet the Press pimping out their new book Come On People: On the Path from Victims to Victors. beststephi is a big Meet the Press fan and watches it pretty much every week.

The interview sparked an interesting conversation between us, (and later, my mother, mamarayne about the current crusades to "ban the "N-word." Steph and my mom seemed to think the word was inappropriate and could never be accepted and should not be used either seriously or in jest, (as many African Americans do in polite conversation today).

If I can paraphrase both Cosby and my mother (as best I can, I'm sure she'll chime in if she disagrees), they made the point that too many people fought and died to not be called nigger and it disrespects their memory to use the word voluntarily now. To paraphrase Steph (again, she'll correct me if I'm wrong), blacks using the word "nigga" makes white people think its ok to use the word.

I tend to disagree with both arguments.

First of all, no one died for the word nigger. And if they did, they are foolish. They died for respect and for a fight against hatred, intolerance and bigotry. The word is merely a symbol of that. A powerful one, I'll grant, but a symbol nonetheless.

At the end of the day, its just a word. Hatred is hatred and ugly is ugly. If tomorrow, we made it a federal crime, punishable by immediate death with no appeal to say the word "nigger" do you know what would happen? There would be a sudden upturn among racists in the usage of the words porchmonkey, coon, spearchucker and jiggaboo. A Klansmen could run into me and call me "boy" or "negro" and I'd know it was offensive merely by his tone of voice. Hell, he could make up a word and call me a "wrikligrubber" and I'd still no he was hating on me. Why? BECAUSE HE'S IN THE FUCKING KLAN!

I asked Steph if she'd be ok if rap songs junked the word "nigga" for "porchmonkey" and she wasn't. So then I asked her if she'd be ok if they junked it in favor of "buddy" and she said that that would be fine, because it's inoffensive. That brings me to my other problem with it. My rationale for why the word MUST continue. What people were actually dying for during the civil rights movement was the right to culture, respect, freedom, and the ability to live their lives in peace, making their own decisions. It is just as wrong of an older generation of blacks to tell a younger generation what words they can and cannot say as it was of the white populace to tell the black populace which restrooms they had to use or which drinking fountain they could sip from.

I get what the word means to people. Really, I've been called it myself. And it does hurt. But taking the word away doesn't remove the hurt or the hatred. It just removes the word. And taking the word away trivializes all that was ever fought for. Rosa Parks didn't suffer so that blacks had to sit in the front of the bus. She suffered so that they could sit anywhere they wanted to.

Later, Steph and I discussed the names of sports teams. I was wearing my Cleveland Indians jersey, in support of their ALCS fight. She asked me how I'd feel if the team were called the Cleveland Slaves. I felt that's different. It's more analogous to call them the Cleveland Negroes or maybe even the Cleveland Spooks. But you know what. It probably wouldn't bother me. But then I'm enlightened like that. I don't think that renaming the Reds, Indians, Braves, Chiefs and Redskins helps remove racism. I think the fact that its an issue is a testament to the fact that the racism still exists. I for one can't wait til the day that the world is so tolerant that you can have an NHL franchise called the Philadelphia Niggas and not offend anyone. That's what I'll call progress.

Until then.... GO TRIBE!

on my truck, my movie career and the next Maverick Jam

2007-10-05T04:33:08Z

10-4-07
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

Note: Once again, cribbed from a 365 post. I'm getting way too lazy to keep two blogs

Day 419 of 365 More.

So it was a big long day. Got up early and had my truck towed to the mechanic. It's been out of commission since July. Hopefully that won't be the case soon.

Went to work. Got a lot done, but then I learned that the local paper finally ran the article about Sarah and me from when we tried out to be extras in the movie on Sunday. The article is kinda... well, a pointless fluff piece, but hey, there's several quotes from me, and I'm a press whore, so go read it.

Did more work.

Got a phone call from a casting director for the movie. Sarah and I are in. We shoot our feature film debut (such that it is) on Tuesday.

Then this evening, Steph and I walked in the Light the Night Leukemia walk in honor of her brother who died when they were kids. I don't know if I mentioned it before, but I think I might have broken a toe wrestling. It's been bugging me for a several weeks now. So walking was kinda a struggle, but its a good cause and I'm glad I did it.

So anyway, about this shot.

The people are clamoring for another Maverick Jam. Listen... oh can't you hear the clamor? I've been trying to decide what to do about it. This year Halloween falls on a Wednesday (damn right it was a good day) which means that possible Halloween party dates are the 27th and the 3rd. Either could work, but then I was thinking, maybe it would make sense to do something else if I did the 3rd. And then my old idea came back to me again. Catholic School Jam, or perhaps Vicars and Tarts Jam (which has been suggested). Or I could do the good old fashioned Halloween Jam.

Halloween Jam is always fun of course, but Catholic School Jam has the bonus that there'll be tons of Catholic School Girl outfits, and well, we've already discussed >my feelings on that.

So that's the question. When's the better day for a party? October 27th or November 3rd? And which party should it be?

365 days

on the Light The Night Walk

2007-09-28T15:58:33Z

11-27-06
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

I usually don't do this sort of advertising thing, but this is for a pretty good cause.

My lovely girlfriend, beststephi and I, are walking in this fundraising walk next week (Oct. 4). Steph's older brother died of Leukemia when they were kids, and so her family has decided to participate in the Light The Night walk in his honor.

It's a pretty important cause and for obvious reasons, it's especially important to them.

If you have any money that you'd like to donate, be it $10 or $10,000, please check out Steph's Donation page. You'll also find links there to more information on cancer research and the Light the Night Walk itself.

Thanks.

on hating censorship...

2007-09-20T04:43:33Z

9-19-07
Originally uploaded by chrismaverick.

If you are a regular reader of 365mav you might note that there was no update yesterday. I did not quit. Flickr decided that I hadn't been moderating my content appropriately, so they marked my account as "moderate". Which essentially means I don't show up in public searches. My photos are still there. They simply aren't exported to the outside of the world. You can find me if you're actively looking for me, but that's it.

This upset me because, though I have obviously posted nudes to flickr, I have taken great care to flag all of them as moderate on my own so as to avoid this very thing happening. I felt that I was within the guidelines. Yesterday, flickr decided (without telling me) that I wasn't. Once I realized I started working to fix the problem, but they won't tell me what I've posted that is offensive to them. At this point I have marked ever nude, implied nude and lingerie shot in my stream as moderate and I have still not been unlocked.

I posted this as today's entry. It may be my last.

Day 404 of 365 More.

If a photographer posts in the middle of flickr and there is no one there to see it, has he really posted?

I kind of feel like no.

So we're now past 24 hours of me being marked moderate on flickr and casual viewers not being able to see my photos. I am very depressed about it. I know it sounds silly, but you have no idea how much of my mentality is wrapped up in being an artist these days. That's why I was always so careful about moderating my photos.A lot of people would actually tell me "oh, that's not bad nudity, you can post that" and I wouldn't because I didn't want to take the chance of being censored. Now I have been.

Last night I went through and marked everything I had tagged nude as moderate, including implied nudes that showed no actual naughty bits. I have always been very good about tagging as well. I had written flickr several times asking what guidelines they wanted me to follow and each time they simply explained to me how to moderate things (I already knew) and not what I was doing that was over the line. I asked for a re-review. I was denied and told:

You still need to be more restrictive in moderating your photostream. You might consider leaving your account classified as "moderate" just to be on the safe side.

Which I considered to be about the most condescending thing ever. Fine, its not my site. It's yahoo's, and rules are rules. But I have repeatedly said (across 5 messages yesterday) that I was willing to comply if I was simply told what it was that they had a problem with. They have refused.

I have now marked every shot I have ever taken that was nude, implied nude, or lingerie as "moderate." This is far more restrictive than just about anyone that I pay attention to.

I am at a loss. I depend on this site as a creative outlet. It is a way to show my work to an audience that I might not normally encounter. Yes, I am aware that people can still see my stuff if they are looking for me specifically, but honestly, I was popular enough on LJ and through my own website that anyone who was already aware of me knew where to find me. What I loved most about this site was that people who I had never heard of before and who never heard of me, were able to simply encounter me and give feedback. I said this sometime ago, during that whole being unemployed thing, that even without a job for a significant portion of it, that first year of 365 was possibly the happiest that I'd ever been in my life as an artist. Even the first time I had a short story published didn't make me feel that way. It wasn't about the money. It wasn't about the showing off. It was about the fact that I had a direct link to people I didn't know who would tell me that something I did changed their lives. That is gone now.

I have been a flickr member since December 5th, 2004. I have posted faithfully every single day for the 365 days project for 404, straight days. I have had hundreds if not thousands of people tell me directly how much I have touched and changed their lives. It has meant the world to me.

There have been good days and bad days. But in all honesty, today is the first day that I have ever, EVER wanted to simply quit.

There aren't many things in this life that I actively care about. There really aren't. Despite what it may seem like, I'm really just kind of a cynical, depressed, asshole of a guy. I may have a heart of gold, but at essence, that's what I am. This was one of those few things I cared about.

And now I feel like its gone.

What's the point?

365 days